Super mooning you
It’s bigger, it’s brighter and it is coming to you. Luna-lovers and stargazers will have a feast on the East coast tonight, as the first supermoon in 11 months will occur just before midnight. A supermoon is a colloquial term for when the Moon reaches perigee, the closest point to Earth in it’s orbit. This makes the Moon noticeably larger, and appears larger still when close to the horizon. As well as being a supermoon, it will also be classed as a Harvest Moon. This is given to the last full moon before the autumn equinox, the light from which was traditionally used to harvest crops by pre-modern farmers. They would reap and pick long into the night with the Moon’s bright light helping them see. Alternatively, if the full Moon appears after the autumn equinox, it’s known as the Hunter’s Moon, as that same light would allow hunters to shoot by.
But wait, didn’t the equinox (Fall’s official start) happen already? Yes indeed, however according to various sources, every few years, since the lunar months and solar year don’t correspond perfectly, a Harvest Moon will appear in October, as is the case this year. “Photographs prove that the Moon is the same width near the horizon as when it’s high in the sky, but that’s not what we perceive with our eyes.” “Thus it’s an illusion rooted in the way our brains process visual information. Even though we’ve been observing it for thousands of years, there’s still not a satisfying scientific explanation for exactly why we see it.” When the Full Moon or New Moon occurs near the Moon’s closest approach to Earth, its perigee, it is often called a Supermoon. When a Full Moon takes place when the Moon is near its closest approach to Earth, it is called a Super Full Moon. When there is a New Moon around the closest point to Earth, it is known as a Super New Moon. Because it’s so close to Earth, a Super Full Moon also looks about 30% brighter than a Micro Full Moon and about 16% brighter than an average Full Moon.
A Micromoon, on the other hand, is when a Full or a New Moon is near its farthest point from Earth, around apogee. The Moon’s orbit around Earth is not a perfect circle, but elliptical, with one side closer to Earth than the other. As a result, the distance between the Moon and Earth varies throughout the month and the year. On average, the distance is about 382,900 kilometers (238,000 miles). Because it’s so close to Earth, a Super Full Moon also looks about 30% brighter than a Micro Full Moon and about 16% brighter than an average Full Moon. The Supermoon on November 14, 2016, was the closest since January 26, 1948. The best time to enjoy a Super Full Moon, or any other Full Moon, is just after moonrise, when the Moon is close to the horizon. Just before moonset is also a good time. When the Full Moon is low, it looks bigger and brighter than when it’s higher up in the sky.
Moon Muses
Neil Armstrong used to tell really bad jokes about walking on the Moon.
When nobody laughed, he would follow with, “Ah well. I guess you had to be there.”
Did you hear about the first restaurant to open on the moon?
It had great food, but no atmosphere.
The moon is basically a Chinese sun.
It reflects the behavior of the original product, but the quality just isn’t the same.
Putin has boasted that Russia is planning to build a base on the moon:
The idea is that astronauts will live there permanently. When they were asked if they really wanted to spend the rest of their lives in a barren, lifeless, empty landscape, the Russians said…
“No. That’s why we want to go to the moon.”
October 7th Birthdays
1967 – Toni Braxton, 1986 – Holland Roden, 1974 – Allison Munn, 1997 – Kira Kosarin,
1955 – Yo Yo Ma, 1959 – Simon Cowell, 1943 – Ollie North, 1931 – Archbishop Desmond Tutu,